File:Puck map (Stooke).jpg

SHADED RELIEF MAP OF PUCK

Puck.gif is a shaded relief map of Puck, the largest of the small inner satellites of Uranus. As with all maps, it is the cartographer's interpretation and not all features are necessarily certain given the limited data available - this interpretation stretches the data as far as is feasible. This map has not yet been published. A description of my interpretation of the surface features of Puck, with a line-dawing map, appears in:

LUNAR & PLANETARY SCIENCE XXV, 1349-1350, 1994.

Positions in the map are controlled by a very simple digital shape model. Voyager 2 took only one useful image of Puck, so little can be said about its shape.

Puck was assumed to be 160 by 155 by 150 km, rotating synchronously about the shorter axis. For this map, the three dimensional convex hull of the shape model was projected into the Morphographic Conformal Projection (the conventional Stereographic Projection modified for non-spherical worlds). The leading side (longitude 90 runs vertically down the centre) faces forwards in the orbit of Puck. The trailing side (longitude 270 runs vertically down its centre) faces backwards along the orbit. Longitude 0 is at the left edge of the leading side map, and faces Uranus. As with all conformal (true shape) projections, the scale in these maps varies, increasing from the centre to the outer edge.

The map projection is described in:

Stooke, P.J. and Keller, C.P., 1990. "Map Projections for Non-Spherical Worlds / the Variable-Radius Map Projections", CARTOGRAPHICA, V. 27, No. 2, pp. 82-100.

This version of the file, with labels intact, is in the public domain.

Philip Stooke,

Department of Geography,

University of Western Ontario,

London, Ontario, Canada N6A 5C2

stooke@sscl.uwo.ca

Original caption[1]

See below.